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“The Vapour Trail” by James Fenton

By Ernest Hilbert • January 4, 2011 • Poetry

Now through the grating of my cell
I look up at a strip of autumn sky
And often, chalked across the blue,
There’s a vapour trail,
A vapour trail . . .
And then, I don’t know why,
I start to think of you.

Dawn brings these planes from distant lands,
Red-eyed tycoons from far-flung ports of call.
Dawn lifts the luggage through the flaps
Onto the carrousel
The carrousel
And wakes the baggage hall.
Dawn will bring you, perhaps.

Perhaps that vapour trail is where
Your plane passed over me here in my jail.
That line is the trajectory
Of your breakfast tray,
Your breakfast tray.
Perhaps that is your trail
And you look down on me.

Look down on me, my friend, look down
And think of me now as I think of you
And think of us as we were then
From your vapour trail,
Your vapour trail . . .
Your line of chalk on blue.
Think well of me again,
+++++++My friend—
+++++++Whatever hurt I may have done,
+++++++

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For I intended none.
+++++++Forgive the hurt that I did not intend
And let it mend. Think well of me again.

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4 Comments

  • Reply 2011 01 04 | verse per se January 4, 2011 at 6:22 pm

    […] The Vapour Trail — James Fenton [E-Verse Radio] “Think well of me again…” […]

  • bobbythelip@aol.com'
    Reply BobbyLip November 2, 2011 at 3:44 pm

    Paul Chowder likes this poem very much. So do I. Who is speaking and to whom, we don’t know. But the voice and the feeling are so human that we must feel we almost know them. We certainly know the sentiment, and it’s lovely. Thanks for posting it.
    I went to a reading by John Ashbery last evening. I liked this much better.

    • Reply Ernie November 2, 2011 at 4:22 pm

      Thanks for writing. I couldn’t agree more. I had the pleasure of attending Mr. Fenton’s Oxford poetry lectures and seminars when he was installed as Oxford Professor of Poetry in the 1990s. He’s a far more important poet than Ashbery, though I feel Ashbery certainly has his moments as a surreal Romantic. Whimsy and such.

      • bobbythelip@aol.com'
        Reply BobbyLip November 19, 2011 at 9:54 am

        Altho I haven’t read him extensively, I think Ashbery is best read in a group rather than alone. Laughter is contagious, and without help, it might have taken me forever to realize that “Farm Implements and Rutabagas in a Landscape” is a sestina. Interestingly, an academic in our group pointed out that today’s undergrads have hardly any idea of who Popeye is.

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Ernest Hilbert

Ernest Hilbert is founder of E-Verse Radio.

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